


the stars lean in a little closer

by damnspacebois (Race_Jackson23)



Series: back to the future but voltron and absolutely nothing like back to the future because i've never seen it [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: ?? - Freeform, Gen, Keith (Voltron) is Bad at Feelings, Keith (Voltron)-centric, Kid Fic, M/M, Multi, Operation Kuron (Voltron), POV Keith (Voltron), Swearing, Time Shenanigans, Time Travel, gratuitous use of the word fuck, will tag more later
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-13
Updated: 2018-07-30
Packaged: 2019-06-09 20:52:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15275955
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Race_Jackson23/pseuds/damnspacebois
Summary: A  daughter from the future and a race against the clock to save Shi-Team Voltronbefore time travelling assassins attack wasn't exactly what Keith was expecting from his first solo mission. And yet, it's exactly what he got."Wait, so you’re my–?”“Daughter, yes,” she nodded, eyes desperately trained on him, before shaking her head. “Doesn’t matter how I got here. But we need to get back to Voltronnow. They’re in danger!Shiro’sin danger!”Keith couldn’t help it. He gaped. It wasn’t often that he was caught off guard, so he’d give her that much credit because he could admit he was, as Lance would say,shook. His brain was shorting out so much he had no idea what to say.Except–“What? The fuck?Who are you?"alternatively known as: that thing i wrote for tumblr in ten minutes that's somehow spawned into a series(??)





	1. keith is so confused

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! So you might have already read parts of this on tumblr, where I've been posting it, but never fear! It's been revamped a bit (but not beta read because what are we, organised??*), lengthened, and given a quotey name so it's not the same as what you'd find on tumblr. Not particularly sure how to rate and tag this, so they might change. That gratuitous use of fuck tag is the only real thing in this club.
> 
> Hope you enjoy!
> 
> *pls let me know if there are mistakes, i've tried to weed them out, but my eyes are so tired.

To say that, at any point, Keith expected a random girl to interrupt his mission by telling him she was his daughter from the future would be nothing more than a lie. He had definitely not expected that. _Ever_. It wasn’t a thing in his contemplation, and he certainly never expected it to become something in his contemplation, and yet…

Well, Keith was apparently part-alien, part of a secret society run by that alien race, and a former paladin of a robot lion that connected with four others to create a massive robot man. He honestly could not say that he had he expected anything that had happened _in his life_.

So his “daughter” turning up from the future?

 _Well_.

~

It went something like this.

Keith had been assigned a solo mission: a simple job, in and out. His first mission since leaving Voltron, it was an easy intelligence collection from a Galran base on a small planet in the Ulipa System. The intel was already collected and awaiting extraction, according to their sources, so all he had to do was go in, retrieve it from their contact on base, and take it back to Kolivan at Blade HQ. Simple and easy.

Except Keith had never known simple and easy in his life, and that mission was no exception.

The extraction went as expected. Their contact, an unexpectedly warm Galran woman, had passed the intel over quickly before darting back to her duties. After making sure that it was secure, Keith had gone to leave, certain that he’d gotten everything. And he was almost out, too, when everything, predictably, went to shit.

Klaxons blared. Shouts carried from down the hallway. As the footsteps of sentries neared, he ducked into an empty room, cursing his luck and hoping that he wouldn’t be seen. After all, it was his _first_ mission without Kolivan watching him like a hawk, and if there was one thing he wanted, it was to return successful and wipe whatever doubt his leader still harboured. Getting seen was a fuck up that _would not_ be helpful on that front.

Alas, Keith’s luck was as stellar as usual, which was to say non-existent. As the footsteps passed where he was hiding, a set slowed down, their shadow reaching through the space between door and floor. He gripped his blade. He closed his eyes and took a breath. Then–

_CLANG!_

Keith’s eyes flew open. His brain took a second to register closed door and that he was still rooted to the spot, because on the other side he could hear curses and blaster fire. Something – _someone_ – was attacking the sentries. For a moment, he wondered if it was the source, but discounted it quickly; she was more a spy than an agent, not suited to close combat attacks.

That’s what it was, make no mistake: an attack. The sentries had been about to find him, he was sure, and someone had attacked to stop them.

 _Maybe it was the source_ , he mused, hand still on his blade as he readied himself to join the fray.

And then he was off. He shoved the door open with his shoulder, drawing his blade in the same moment, and threw himself into the fight. He barely had time to note the hooded figure that had taken on the sentries to save him before his knife transformed into a longer blade. There was a sentry faced away from him just within reach. His blade went through it just as it turned, the sparking body hitting the floor as he moved onto the next sentry, which was far more prepared for his attack.

Sentries were hardy and strong, of Galra-make, but so was Keith and he was quicker to boot. His saviour was too, sweeping through the bots like a bowling ball through pins and, together, they made quick work of them. Then it was over and all Keith could do was stare at the person who saved his butt.

“Are you with the Blade?” he questioned – stupidly, because he could see their Marmorite mask as the heat of battle melted away and the figure turned to him.

Whatever it was they saw had them visibly stiffening.  They froze, and then their mask peeled away to reveal–

A human.

But Keith didn’t have much time to question them – her?? – because then blaster fire was raining down upon them both. They jerked apart, finding cover by the hallway’s walls, and not for the first time, Keith bemoaned how Kolivan would take it if he got hit by a bolt.

_“It’s really nothing, Kolivan, just a scratch.”_

He shook his head. _Not_ a good idea _at all_.

Looking over at his saviour, he considered what to do. On one hand, he was close enough to the base door that he could _probably_ get out by himself, but definitely could if the other took the fire. It would mean completing the mission and getting the plans back to Kolivan while leaving whoever his saviour was behind, but if they were with the Blade like their suit suggested, they’d understand. But on the other hand … they’d tried to help him.

Cursing himself under his breath, he gestured at his comrade. Their mask had gone back up at some point so it was impossible to know if they were watching him. He hoped so, and the way they cocked their head made him optimistic.

“On three,” he mouthed and they gave him a jerky nod. “One … two … _three_!”

If Keith were one to glorify battle, that would be the one to glorify. It was _electric_. He felt fluid, every move near-effortless. As if connected by some mystical force, they moved together in tandem, taking different angles yet instinctively knowing when their paths crossed. Before he knew it, their enemies were once again a pile of twisted metal and sparking cords.

“Come on,” he said, jerking his head to the exit. “More are coming.”

His companion nodded and they fell into step. Luckily, he hadn’t needed to park his ship that far from the base, and by the time more sentries had found the spot where he’d hidden it, they were long gone.

It was only once his ship had departed the system and was making its way towards the rendezvous point that his brain had time to catch up to the rest of him. _Stupid_ , he realised. _Absolutely stupid. You have no idea who this person is._

There wasn’t much for it, though, and they _did_ have a Marmora suit. Considering how Zarkon had yet to capture an agent, it was unlikely that his companion was a spy sent to infiltrate the Blade. Even so … they had a lot to discuss.

“Who are you?” he asked, setting the ship to auto-pilot and dropping his mask to face his companion. “Did Kolivan send you after me?”

They shook their head and their mask came down too. As he took in their face, he knew he wasn’t wrong when he’d first seen them; ~~they were~~ _she was_ undeniably human. High cheekbones, sun kissed skin, dark hair; pretty by human standards, even if she looked as of a storm was brewing under her skin. With dark eyes set in her pointed face, she regarded him with something akin to wariness teetering on confusion, and Keith was struck by how _familiar_ she looked.

Without meaning to, his brain started racing. He was the only one of his kind in the Blade, he knew, and the chances that he’d run into another human with their equipment? They were low, low enough that there was a high chance he’d be related to whoever it was. And it didn’t help that they looked alike, with both of them having the same angular, pointed faces, the same noses. His heart beat quicker.

Could she be his mother?

 _No_ , he scoffed. _No, she isn’t old enough for that_. His companion was around his age, her face young and likely unlined when not scrunched up in that angry-confusion look she had going on. More likely that she was a cousin or … a sister.

Realising she hadn’t responded and that instead they’d been staring at each other while he contemplated _how related they were_ , Keith cleared his throat, face going red. Pink dusted her cheeks as well and she closed her mouth with a look of surprise, as if she hadn’t realised it was open. Her eyes, wide like a doe’s, grew even wider.

“Who are you?” he repeated, and that odd feeling of _I’ve seen this girl somewhere before_ crept over him again.

And then she opened her mouth and everything got that much weirder.

~

So there he was, in the middle of a Galran fighter after his first ever successful solo mission, being told about how Voltron and the entire space-time continuum was in danger because his daughter _from the future_ had somehow fucked up and assassins were trying to kill them.

It was, officially, the _weirdest day of his entire existence_ and, considering that he once flew a giant sentient robot lion, that was truly saying something.

That being said … he didn’t believe a word of it. Who would? Her story was _insane_ from start to finish with too many holes in it to be credible. It sounded like a plot from one of the bad sci fi fanfics Shiro used to write in his free time. And not that he knew enough about science to say anything, but was it even theoretically possible, let alone actually possible?

“Wait, so you’re my–?”

“Daughter, yes,” she nodded, eyes desperately trained on him, before shaking her head. “Doesn’t matter how I got here. But we need to get back to Voltron  _now_. They’re in danger!  _Shiro’s_ in danger!”

Keith couldn’t help it. He gaped. It wasn’t often that he was caught off guard, so he’d give her that much credit because he could admit he was, as Lance would say, _shook_. His brain was shorting out so much he had no idea what to say.

Except–

“ _What_? The fuck?  _Who are you_?”

The girl huffed, pushing back her hood. Her dark hair was pulled into a long braid and, as he watched, she drew it all into a tight bun and pinned it up with a clip he swore he hadn’t seen her produce, all the while glaring at him, and, yep, _that_  was an expression he’d seen on his own face. Didn’t mean he believed her, though. It’d take a lot more than a disgruntled look to make him believe that she was his _daughter_ from the _future_ – give him a break, he wasn’t an idiot.

 _Then again_ , a nasty voice in his head reminded him,  _he never would have believed Voltron was a thing five years ago_.

He shook his head. Apples and oranges. One was an alien war requiring he fly a magic warship, which was, admittedly, far-fetched, but the other was a time travelling daughter bringing warnings about the universe ending, which was _even more_ far-fetched.

“I need to go back to Voltron?” he replied finally, unable to keep his doubts from seeping into his tone. “One: I have no idea who you are. Two: why should I trust some random girl just because she said she was my kid from the future? I don’t even want kids!”

Her face twisted.

“I don’t have time for this!” she snapped, taking a step forward. “Do you want to save Papa or not?”

“Papa?! I thought you said I was your dad?!” he exclaimed. His eyes narrowed even further, to the point where he was sure they’d become slits. “I knew this was bullshit.”

The girl froze, her face still contorted in rage, then she cursed under her breath.

“Forget it,” she huffed. “You fucking suck. Put me down on the nearest inhabitable planet and I’ll do it myself.”

And there went his temper. He could feel it bubbling in his chest, heating up his cheeks, and no matter how he chanted his usual mantra at himself to keep calm, he couldn’t stop himself.

“Do what?” he shot back. Blood rushed uncomfortably in his ears as he stepped forward, only for his anger to ignite further as she took another back. “Save Voltron? _Shiro_? You think the team will just welcome you into the Castle with open arms?”

She glared at him, but it was hardly a deterrent. If anything, her fury only egged him on and made his worse.

“This story you’re trying to spin?” he growled. “Sounds fake. Sounds like something a spy would try, and if you think I’m going to let you go knowing that you could try this shit with them and put them in danger, you hav–”

“I’m not a spy!” she said. “I’m telling the truth!”

“Prove it!” Keith snapped.

And then she was drawing a knife on him. Instinct took over. In a movement so smooth he almost surprised himself, he leapt into her space with his own blade aimed at her throat. She parried, but stumbled, giving him the opening to throw her into the side of the ship. The ship jolted then steadied, but his attention was drawn for that split second. Too late, he realised that she’d managed to get her blade up, and like the edge of his blade was pressed into her collarbone, so too was hers to the hollow of his throat.

He glanced down, and–

_That was his blade._

His brain completely blanked. For the second time, he was so taken aback that he could only blurt out the first thing that came to mind.

“Where did you get that?”

At least it was vaguely relevant.

Keith looked up from the blade –  _his_  blade, it’s  _his blade_ ,  _how does she have his blade_  – to find her watching him. Her familiar eyes were unerring, trained upon his with a fire that shocked him because, again, he’d seen that expression before on his own face but he’d never seen it with  _those_  eyes. And because she was so completely  _fearless_ , unconcerned, at a situation where one would be should be. It was as if she hasn’t noticed the knife at their throat, ignoring it completely in favour of staring him down.

“Will you help me?” was all she said.

His brain was still swimming in everything she’d said, at the point where he was unable to process any of it. The only thing that stuck – the only thing that he could vaguely understand – was that his knife and her knife were the _exact same blade_.

“Where did you get that?” he repeated, grip tightening on the blade in his hand. The one that was _identical_ to the one in hers. “Tell me!”

Her eyes flared.

“You gave it to me,” she responded. Where before she’d had her annoyance written plainly in the curl of her mouth, it had all but disappeared, lost to the sudden intensity of her pleas. He felt dizzy. “When I was fifteen. You said I was ready to  _learn_. And I did, about being a Blade, about being a  _paladin_ , but I fucked it all up and I need your help to fix it.”

He didn’t believe her. He couldn’t believe her. It was … insane. Completely insane.

And _yet_.

 _Fuck_.

Unwillingly, Keith found his grip loosening, both on his knife and on her shoulder. Through it all, her gaze remained trained on his, those dangerously familiar eyes strangely soft and yet not at the same time, because those eyes were meant to be soft and he was cursing inwardly because _how had it taken him so long to realise where he’d seen them?_

“Will you help me?”

 _Fuck_.

Keith cleared his throat.

“I don’t even know your name,” he said, the resolve wavering in his voice.

The girl gave him a small smile, and, once again, he was struck by the oddest sense of déjà vu. He’d seen that smile before. Despite the reasonable part of him that insisted it was impossible, he  _knew_  that he’d seen that smile before.

 _Fuck_.

“I’m Yumiko.  _Shirogane_  Yumiko.”

And of course, that would be when Empire ships descended upon them. Because that truly summed up Keith’s luck.

 _Fuck_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come talk to me on [tumblr](https://damnspacebois.tumblr.com). There's more of this on there if you know where to look :eyes emoji:


	2. keith is still confused

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for taking so long! Hope you enjoy!

By the time Yumiko dragged them from the wreckage of their ship, Keith had surpassed any emotional state known to man. He was ~~furious~~ ~~confused~~ ~~tired~~ _completely done._ With everything. _No emotionally stable Keith available, sorry, maybe later_.

He snorted at the thought. _Later_ couldn’t come soon enough, especially when one was being chased by Galra sentries.

“Can you be quiet?” hissed Yumiko. She glared up at him through the leaves of the tree they were perched in, her expression yet again setting off the all-too-familiar alarm bells that he was learning to tune out. “They’ll hear us.”

And wasn’t that a terrifying thought? Outflying the Empire ships, escaping to another system and eventually crashing only to end up a prisoner of the Empire because they’d overheard his freak out? It would be … the most embarrassing thing he’d ever do. Lance would never let him live it down, assuming he lived long enough to hear it.

 _According to_ Yumiko _you do_ , whispered a snide voice at the back of his head, and damn if that didn’t make him shudder. It was just weird on so many levels. But he acquiesced to her demand anyway, settling down into the branches to wait for the all clear, which came hours later when the sun had dipped below the horizon.

“Ok, they’re gone,” she said finally.

Too exhausted to say anything, his head pounding uncomfortably, Keith followed her down the tree trunk and into the underbrush towards the remains of their ship. Made up of a number of different environments, the planet they’d landed on was not unlike Earth, he’d noted before they crashed, and they had crashed not far from a copse of trees at the bottom of a rocky outcrop. It had become a welcome shelter from the sentries sent after them, especially after Yumiko slapped some device on his chest that left him feeling buzzed all over but apparently blocked Galra sensors, and he was loathe to leave it, but they had to move.

The trek back to the ship was short and yet it felt like a lifetime. The air around them grew chilly, and the longer they walked, the more the ground under their feet turned rocky, the underbrush sparse and thorny. That the sun had already gone down was the only positive. Keith shuddered to imagine what it would have been like walking back with it beating down on their necks alongside the fear of discovery.

Luckily, the Galra had not seen fit to guard their crash site too heavily. Their perimeter was lax and, like the base, it had only taken Keith and his companion moments to despatch the sentries left there. After a few moments at their ship, it was clear why.

“Nothing we can do for it,” Keith muttered, poking around at the torn metal while Yumiko watched. She cursed in response. “We’ll have to find another way off the planet.”

He sighed, shimmying out of the ship’s ruins and back to Yumiko, who was waiting with arms crossed and a pensive expression on her face. The way her brows furrowed over slate-grey eyes was– his heart beat uncomfortably in his chest.

 _No_.

She appeared not to notice his distraction, instead toeing the dirt by her shoe as she stared off into the distance. Then something settled over her and she turned to him, chin jutting out.

“The scanners picked up a base a few kliks out before we crashed. There’ll be ships there, so all we need to do is steal one.”

Keith gaped. “Are you insane?” he asked. “By the time we get there, they’ll know we’re coming. We’ll be walking into a trap.”

Her gaze was undaunted.

“Then we’ll have to be extra careful.” As he went to protest, she silenced him with a look. It was the same one from before, that intense pleading. “Voltron’s in danger. _Shiro’s_ in danger.”

It was dumb. The smart thing to do would be to salvage what they could from the ship, rig up a comm line, and wait until the Blades sent out someone to pick them up. It might take a while – weeks, or months even, and that was assuming their rigged comm even worked – but it was the best approach to the situation. It was the approach he was trained for.

_Fuck._

Kolivan would not be impressed with him when he found out what Keith was planning – and he _was_ already planning it because hearing _Shiro’s in danger_ was enough to have all sorts of plans forming in his brain – nor would he approve of any of it. Bad enough that Keith had botched his first mission, but going on another infiltration that he _knew_ would likely fail? If he lived, Kolivan would murder him.

So as his headache grew noticeably worse, Keith replied, “What do you have in mind?”

Her answering smile just made him even more tired.

~

It went to hell immediately. Keith had been right, of course.

They’d trekked across rocky plains to the Galran installation nestled at the base of a mountain range and, once there, had taken a few hours to rest and run reconnaissance. After all, Keith might be the dumb bitch who agreed to infiltrate a heavily fortified base without backup, but he wasn’t a complete idiot, and Yumiko approved of the idea with little fuss. Resting fitfully in turns, they’d learnt what they could, and then they were off.

As blasters trained on them where they were surrounded in one of the base’s hallways, though, Keith could admit that they hadn’t learnt nearly enough.

“Cuff them,” called one of the Galran soldiers. From the way that the sentries moved immediately to follow her orders, it was clear she was the ranking officer. “We’re taking them to Warlord Ranveig.”

Anger churned in Keith’s belly, and for a second, he considered taking on the whole lot of them. But then Yumiko stepped on his foot and it jolted him so abruptly that he dropped his blade. Before he could reach for it, the sentries were upon them. He struggled against the tight grip on his arms, yowling, and then–

_Thwack!_

Pain exploded behind Keith’s right ear. He saw stars. Then the floor went out from under him.

“It’ll be easier if you don’t resist,” a voice said as he was dragged across the floor.

If he weren’t still reeling, if his eyesight weren’t blurry, if his mask wasn’t obscuring what he could see – if, if, _if_ – he might’ve recognised it. He might have even noticed Yumiko’s double-take. But the situation was what it was, and so all he knew as they were carted off to Ranveig was the painful cold of the hallway and distant murmurs of some lullaby he couldn’t remember ever hearing.

~

Keith was aware of people talking around him. He knew, logically, that some of it was even important, but he couldn’t for the life of him tune into the conversation. It wasn’t until part way through that his brain reengaged.

Coincidentally, it was to someone saying his name.

“And then Keith, y’know, Keith Kogane here, Keeeeeeeeith, he said we should just walk through. Very sorry about that, _Keith_ didn’t realise it was a top-secret base.”

They were in some sort of command centre. Sentries sat at consoles while two held him aloft and the rest had weapons trained on him and another space off to his right. No doubt that was Yumiko and a glance in that direction noted her maskless face and proved him right. Then his attention was caught by something else. In front of them, glaring down, stood a broad-shouldered Galran, adorned simply but intricately enough to state his position. With every word Yumiko mumbled, his glare grew worse until Keith could basically feel it scorching his face.

And she still babbled on.

“Really, we’re sorry for the inconvenience, but if you let us go on, we’ll – that is, Keeeeeeeeith and I, y’know, Keith Kogane? – get out of your hair,” she said.

Ranveig said nothing for a moment before turning to the Galran beside him, no doubt his lieutenant.

“You said they might be with the Blade,” he grunted.

The other Galran nodded.

“Yes,” she replied. Her purple ears stood alert but she was otherwise expressionless. “We found luxite blades on them both. Preliminary intelligence from HQ suggests that our hidden enemy is fond of the substance’s use in their weapons, so it is not outside the realm of possibility that they belong to that order.”

“With the way the war is shaping up, it was only a matter of time before we managed to catch them out,” Ranveig hummed contemplatively.

Keith’s heart plummeted. As if being the first human Blade and thus far weaker than the others was bad enough, he was also going to be the first captured. Not that he hadn’t expected it with Yumiko’s dumb plan, but still. Kolivan was going to _kill_ him.

_If they made it out in the first place._

“Still, we must not grow complacent,” said Ranveig, shaking his head and turning his cold eyes back to the lieutenant. “Have the sentries take these two to the brig. I want you to personally escort the luxite to Research then see what you can get out of our … guests.”

“Understood.”

Yumiko piped up, “Really, you don’t need to go out of your way or anything–”

But Ranveig had already turned his back and his underlings were rushing to his bidding. The lieutenant jerked her head at the sentries and then Keith and Yumiko were off, struggling all the while.

Not that it stopped their captors. They were in the brig not three minutes later.

But unlike Yumiko, who seemed, by the yelling at the sentries as they locked the door behind them, to possess all her mental faculties, Keith was still processing what had happened. Blurred as his vision was and with the headache still splitting his head like an anvil, he was having a hard time of it. Concentrating was an impossible task, let alone remembering what had happened not ten minutes before.

So he didn’t. Sleeping was easier.

~

And so that was how Keith botched his first ever mission, outflew a Galra fleet only to crash, and infiltrated another base only to find himself in the brig with the girl who claimed she was his future daughter.

“What was that?” he hissed when he eventually came to. He pressed his fists to his eyes, hoping to massage out his headache as what happened earlier filtered into his brain. “‘Keith, y’know, Keith Kogane here, Keeeeeeeeith’ – what – why did you keep repeating that?”

He could basically hear the shrug of false innocence in her voice as she replied, “Is Keith Kogane not your name?”

With a huff in response, he started pacing and silence descended upon them.

Not for the first time since they’d crashed, Keith couldn’t help but curse himself. After all, it wasn’t as if he’d ever believed this random person or anything ~~that would be crazy~~ but he had basically let her derail his mission. All she’d needed to say was _Shiro_ and she had him convinced that running half-cocked into the nearest Galra base was a good idea. And not to mention he hadn’t said anything when she’d tried to trick their captors with constant repetitions of his name(?? and how did she think that would work??), though considering how out of it he was, he wasn’t sure how accountable he could be held.

Still, the whole thing was her fault, but it was on him too. If he hadn’t been so impetuous – _hadn’t let the merest mention of Shiro being in danger cloud his judgement_ – they would not have been in their position. Hell, if they had just waited a week before breaking into a highly secure facility, they might have been ok. He should have known better. And yet, there they were.

As if summoned by his thoughts, Yumiko broke the silence.

“Y’know, if you stopped wearing tracks in the floor for five seconds,” she quipped, seemingly emboldened as he turned to her, “we might be able to talk about this. No, seriously, we have a lot to discuss.”

Understatement of the year, in Keith’s opinion, and he said as much with a frown. She nodded, getting to her feet so that they were on the same eye level.

“Yeah. Honestly. None of this is going to plan and I’m fairly certain I’ve just screwed up the timeline beyond repair or sped it up at least, but we’ll find out soon enough. Might get us out of this mess. Might just wink me out of existence, for all I know.”

Her voice quavered on that last bit. He really looked at her then; looked past the hard set her jaw had been in the entire time of their acquaintance, the otherwise expressionless cast of her mouth. The bags under her eyes stood out like dark bruises, and he wasn’t sure if it were the poor lighting or something else, but her skin was waxy-pale. That quiver, too…

Yumiko hadn’t said much since they’d met, other than the basic rundown of her supposed situation, though not that there had been much time. Considering that, it was hardly surprising that he didn’t know her very well, but that being said, if he were a betting man, he’d say she was shaken. And if what she said was true – and he wasn’t saying it was, because it was insane – then, well, he wouldn’t blame her for it. He … actually felt a little bad.

“I’m sure it’s going to be fine?” he tried, wincing when his attempt to reassure ended on a questioning note. “I’m sure you won’t … wink out of existence.”

She snorted.

“You’re only saying that because you don’t believe that I’m from the future,” she said, inclining her head at him.

He shrugged and went to sit down. She copied, sitting cross-legged as she continued on with a head tilt.

“I mean, I wouldn’t believe me either, it is a little crazy,” she muttered. “If someone came up to me all, ‘I’m your daughter from the future’, I’d be all, ‘the fuck?’, too. And honestly, I shouldn’t have said anything, I've already fucked things up as is, but I kinda … I dunno. It’s true, though." She nodded rapidly. "I’m yours. And Shiro’s.”

Keith’s heart stuttered. She was looking at him with such an earnest expression, her slate eyes wide with honesty. Though he might think her crazy, she clearly believed whatever she was saying. Unhelpfully, his mind provided another face, and he had to shove it aside quickly before his imagination strayed.

“You just told me that you’re my daughter from the future,” he said slowly, “and, honestly, the most unbelievable thing to me is that you’re apparently my daughter with Shiro.”

“Why would that be unbelievable?” She frowned.

“Be-because he’s like a brother to me!” Keith spluttered. Yumiko’s eyes went big, and he found himself explaining, “He just … doesn’t … _see me_ that way.”

She blinked. There was a pause. Then –

“Sorry, I, uh … just never realised young you was such a colossal dumbass.”

An indignant squawk escaped him, but before he could say anything in his defence, the door to their cell _swooshed_ open. They both started, cringing back from the lieutenant illuminated in the doorway. She stepped inside. That moment from the command centre was blurry in his mind, but from what he could remember, she was as expressionless as the last time he had seen her. In fact, the only difference, it seemed, was that there were no sentries around.

 _What was she doing?_ he wondered. If she wanted to question them, why was she by herself? To throw them off?

“Took you long enough,” said Yumiko, her tone dry as she got to her feet.

Both Keith and the lieutenant turned quickly to look at her. She only offered a shrug in reply, her right eyebrow quirked as she focused on the lieutenant at the doorway with a look far too nonchalant for someone whose current residence was a prison cell. The Galran must have thought so too, because she shifted, her eyes narrowing as she crossed her arms over her chest.

“Did I ask you a question?” she said with all the air of a woman unimpressed.

A shiver ran down Keith’s spine as whispers of a lullaby washed over him. His heart panged again, but again, he pushed it aside in favour of getting to his feet, unwilling to be on uneven ground. It was unimportant in light of how dangerous the situation was.

But again, Yumiko had other plans.

“You didn’t,” she replied. Then she deliberately turned and fixed her gaze on him, and he could only narrow his in response. “But he did. You wanted to know why I kept saying your name?”

 _That tone_. It was far too smug for Keith’s liking. The wink she threw at him was too, although her smirk grew brittle as old bone.

“Told you the timeline’s all screwed up, so I made it work for us. What better way than letting your mother know _exactly_ who she’s throwing in the brig?”

He whirled on the lieutenant. Her mouth ajar in surprise, she took a step back.

_Fuck._

“You’re my–”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So yeah, I was like "should i make harmless thing that doesn't make any changes to overall plot or not?" And I decided ... not. I've gone with the long version which basically chops canon into little pieces :D come chat to me about it on [tumblr](https://damnspacebois.tumblr.com)

**Author's Note:**

> Come talk to me on [tumblr](https://damnspacebois.tumblr.com). There's more of this on there if you know where to look :eyes emoji:


End file.
